


Magic Uncharted

by AmaraqWolf



Category: Skulduggery Pleasant - Derek Landy, Uncharted
Genre: Crossover, F/M, M/M, Post-Canon, The Dead Men (Skulduggery Pleasant)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-11
Updated: 2014-11-20
Packaged: 2018-02-20 17:47:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2437565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmaraqWolf/pseuds/AmaraqWolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Victor Sullivan has something he's been hiding from Nate, but that time's about to come to an end. </p>
<p>This is a crossover between the <i>Uncharted</i> video game series and the <i>Skulduggery Pleasant</i> book series - specifically purplejabberwocky's AU in which all the Dead Men survive the war. This was born from discussions of implausibility in the <i>Uncharted</i> universe, and is meant for light fluff and humour.</p>
<p>(In other words, it won't be anywhere near as dark as most of the things I write.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

  * For [purplejabberwocky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplejabberwocky/gifts).



Despite what various and sundry might say, Sully wasn’t born yesterday. He got the plane for old times’ sakes, and that was a good idea; but when they made it back to England to tell Chloe and Cutter the good news, Nate disappeared and left Sully to his own devices. Oh, he tried to be all cloak-and-dagger about it, coming up with all sorts of stories about finances and rooms and practical issues, but he just wanted to be alone with Elena. And Sully wasn’t born yesterday.

He booked a room as far on the other side of the hotel from Nate’s as he could, dumped his bag on the bed, and went downstairs to find the bar.

Damn, but he was really getting too old for this. Every single joint ached, every single muscle was on fire. There were times he envied Nate that ability to keep chugging forever. Nothing but the end of the world was going to stop Nate once he set his mind to something. Zombies, yetis, the goddamn crap Marlowe’s vampire buddy pulled – nothing even slowed Nate down. It would be impressive if it wasn’t so goddamn terrifying.

“Bourbon,” he told the bartender. “On the rocks. Make it snappy.”

He sure envied Nate right _now_. Sully almost laughed at how pathetic this entire thing was, and might even have gone on to tell the barkeep exactly that when two other men walked into the empty bar. Sully usually made it a point to know who he was drinking with, and an empty bar like this, you were drinking with whoever else happened to be there. That was the only reason he gave them a second look. That, and he was getting into the habit of expecting bar fights.

One of them looked an awful lot like Nate, actually, only with blonde hair instead of brown.

They took a table in the back corner, far enough away that Sully relaxed a little. He turned back to the bourbon put in front of him and gave the bartender a grateful half-wave before settling down to drown his pathetic sorrows in the swirling brown liquid.

Then he heard one of the men behind him say ‘Atlantis,’ and Sully stiffened. So much for a relaxing night.

Was there a way to get closer without being obvious about it? Probably not. Sully gave it a try anyway. He took his drink and slid off the stool, walked over to the doorway, and leaned against the frame with his back to the two men as he drank from his glass. Casual as anything, not a single cause for alarm, and now he could hear every word being said.

“What do you mean, it _sank_?”

“I mean it grew wings, took off, and rose into the sky. What the hell do you _think_ I mean, Vex?”

“The whole city?”

“I watched it. It sank like it was in a giant whirlpool, and the sand covered it. Ain’t no way in or out now.”

The man with blonde hair was Irish. The other sounded vaguely Moroccan, maybe with a hint of Spanish, but his English was impeccable. Sully couldn’t tell if they were more of Marlowe’s stooges or not, but he wasn’t willing to take the chance they weren’t. He finished off the glass and took a step forward –

“Whoever did it, Vex, you owe them one hell of a favour.”

– and immediately shifted back, wondering how coincidental it would seem if he wandered over right now and asked for a reward.

“Sure,” said Vex, sounding distracted. “So there’s no chance of you telling us who it was, then?”

“What makes you think I know?”

“You said you saw the city sink. You didn’t see anyone else?”

“Some desert nomads, but I know them. They didn’t do it.”

“No best guess on who did?”

“That’s _your_ department, Vex, not mine.”

“Good Samaritan? Bad Samaritan? Neutral Samaritan with a penchant for rampant destruction?”

The Moroccan sighed. “My _best guess_ is that a guy who had no idea what the hell he was doing kicked the wrong piece of rotten wood. The place is old. If there is a way of sinking it, there’s no one left alive who knows it. Had to have been an accident. I don’t know what he was actually there _for_ , but whatever it was, he didn’t get it.”

Like hell he didn’t. What kind of coincidence was this, anyway? They were in _England_. What were the odds that they would pick the exact same hotel as a couple of guys casually discussing the burial of a city in the middle of the Rubal Khali desert?

“Sorcerer?” Vex asked. “Mortal who knows about sorcerers? Ghost? Oh, I know. A yeti.”

Sully broke away from the doorway, left his glass in a plant pot just outside, and went to go bang on Nate’s door. Bad enough that they’d been chased by insane overenthusiastic cult hunters for the last month, but if their every footstep was going to be dogged by people cut from the exact same cloth –

“Hey! Watch where you’re –”

“Sorry.” Sully backed off with his hands in the air. “My fault. Enjoy your evening.”

“… He- _lo_.”

Despite himself, Sully stopped. That sounded really disturbingly like something Sully only ever wanted to hear from gorgeous women in exotic locales. “Excuse me?”

The man Sully bumped into coming down the stairs flashed him a wicked grin. “Looking good, old man. What has _you_ in such a hurry?”

Sully blinked, and then burst into laughter. “I’m a good fifty years your senior, kid. I’m flattered, but you’ll have better luck at the bar.”

“Oh, I _know_ I’ll have better luck at the bar. That’s where my husband is. Doesn’t negate your specialty, though, and _you_ are a silver fox if ever I saw one. My husband’s adventurous, you know. We could have some fun tonight.”

As a good rule of thumb, Sully tried to avoid doing things that pissed people off. That required being a lot more open-minded than he actually was, but it worked, and it _made_ him more open-minded than he was. But if there was one thing Sully learned which kept him alive all that time, it was not to get involved in the business of insane, overenthusiastic cult hunters. In that moment, he expanded his definition to include those cult hunters’ husbands, and a really, really good way to escape without arousing suspicion was to pretend to be offended.

So he did. “Look, kid, I’m gonna have to call the cops if you don’t back off.”

The stranger was the one to back off now, immediately and with his own hands raised. “Hey! No need to get snarky. I can tell when I’m not wanted.”

“Good. Now get lost.”

“Getting lost.” The man gave Sully a small, cheerful salute, completely unperturbed, and turned to head to the bar with a hand in his pocket and whistling a jaunty tune. Sully watched him go, then turned and took the stairs up two at a time.

He banged on Nate’s door barely a minute later, making no effort to be quiet or polite. Or discreet, for that matter. “Nate, leave your girlfriend alone a minute and get out here. We’ve got a problem.”

It may have been their pseudo-honeymoon, but Nate’s instincts were as sharp as ever. Sully only had to bang again once before the door swung open, revealing Nate pulling on a shirt and looking none too pleased. “Jesus, Sully, would you give it a rest? What’s going on?”

“Marlowe found us.”

“Marlowe’s dead, Sully.”

“Okay, Marlowe’s pals found us. They’re down in the bar right now. We have to go, Nate. Right now.”

Nate groaned and turned back into the room. “Don’t these guys ever take a break? The city’s gone. What could we possibly have that they want?”

“I don’t know, kid.” And he didn’t, really. He didn’t really want to stick around and find out either. “But they’re here, and they know what you did, and the only reason they’re not breaking this door down right now is that they don’t know you’re here.”

“They don’t?” Nate turned to give Sully an incredulous look. “That’s one hell of a coincidence.”

“You’re tellin’ me. Where’s Elena?”

“Getting clothes on. We _were_ kind of in the middle of something, Sully.”

“If you want me to pass on the warning next time, I’ll get my own ass out and call you from the road.” Sully’s hand dipped into his pocket for his car keys. “Will you tell her to hurry up? It’s only a matter of time before one of them – aw, crap.”

“What?”

Sully’s pocket was empty. There wasn’t anywhere else he would have left his car keys, except maybe his room, which was all the way on the other side of the hotel, past the bar and up the stairs – but he would have taken them when he went to the bar, so what did he –

– the overenthusiastic cult hunter’s husband. He picked Sully’s pocket. Dammit. His flirting was a _cover_.

… He picked _Sully’s_ _pocket_.

“I think we’re going to have to run,” he muttered, showing Nate his empty hands.

It took Nate a moment, but then he laughed. “They pickpocketed you?”

Sully grunted.

“They pickpocketed _you_?”

“Are you going to stand there and laugh at me, Nate, or are you going to hurry up so we can get the hell out of here?”

“I’m hurrying, I’m hurrying.” Nate grabbed his pistol off of the small coffee table and strapped it into his shoulder holster. “Please tell me we’re _not_ going to have to fight our way out of the hotel. I actually _like_ this hotel.”

“Oh, God.” Elena appeared from the bedroom, tying her hair up into a bun. “We have to fight our way out of the hotel? What did you guys do now?”

“Elena –”

“ _How_ did you guys do… whatever you did?”

“We must have been followed,” Sully cut in before Nate and Elena could get into one of their arguments. “They’re down in the bar right now. Now, if we’re lucky, maybe we can sneak around them before they find out what room we’re in, but…”

“… but when are we ever lucky?” Nate finished for him, nodding. “Right. Elena, grab a gun.”

She laughed dryly. “Are you kidding? You guys get lucky all the time. You’ve jumped onto speeding _trains_ , and you’re still here.”

Sully rolled his eyes, grabbed a gun of his own, and went to make sure the hallway was empty. It was. If the overenthusiastic cult hunters used his keys to try and track down which room they’d booked, they’d be on the other side of the hotel. Maybe, for once, things were actually working out in their favour. “Coast’s clear,” he called back into the room. “Get out here while it’s still clear.” _Please_.

It took them another minute. Sully let Nate lead the way, and all three hid their guns under jackets until they were out of the hotel. They headed in the opposite direction of Sully’s car in the parking lot, and stopped outside a bright yellow Jeep.

“This has to be their car,” said Nate.

Sully frowned. “How do you figure?”

“Only other car in the parking lot. Besides, it’s a Jeep.”

“What does it being a Jeep have to do with it?” Elena asked.

Nate shrugged. “Bad guys use Jeeps. Maybe we can hotwire it.”

“Give me a minute.” Sully was already on the other side of the Jeep, using an old wire coat hanger from the hotel’s cloakroom to unlock the door from the inside. Thank God for English hotels and their cloakrooms. If this were anywhere back home, the hangers would have been nailed down and impossible to steal.

“I thought _we_ used Jeeps,” said Elena. “A Jeep is what got you to that plane, Nate, remember?”

“Well, yeah. But that was only because we stole it from the bad guys.”

“Like we’re doing now, you mean?”

“Exactly like we’re doing now.”

The door lock clicked. Sully threw away the hanger, swung into the driver’s seat, and pulled open the panel to expose the car’s wiring. “You two going to get in, or stand there making doe eyes at each other all night?”

“You’re grumpy,” Nate remarked once they’d both got in.

“I was looking forward to a break,” Sully muttered just as the car’s engine roared to life. “All I wanted was a couple of drinks and maybe some Pay Per View, get an early night and sleep like a baby. Now I’m hotwiring a Jeep with a gun in my pocket, and I don’t even know where we’re going. Where are we going?”

“Let’s just focus on getting out of here,” said Nate. “If we make some headway, we’ll stop for the night at a motel somewhere. We can figure out where to go in the morning.”

“Uh-huh.” Sully glanced up at the rearview. “And that has nothing to do with the two of you being – ah, _crap_.”

Nate glanced over his shoulder. “What now?”

“They’ve spotted us.” Sully gave up on the idea of perfect driving and guided the Jeep forward rather than back, away from where both Vex and his husband had just left the Hotel, reveling in a small bit of satisfaction at the expressions of shock on their faces as their car was driven away from under them.

“What are you waiting for?” said Nate. “Gun it!”

“I’m gunning it, I’m gunning it,” Sully grumbled as he gunned it out of the parking lot. “Jesus, keep your shirt on, kid. There’s no way they’ll be able to catch up with us now.”

“This is _their car_ , Sully. All they have to do is report it stolen.”

Sully laughed. “That is, if they didn’t steal it themselves.” Besides which, Sully had never known overenthusiastic cult hunters to involve the police if they could possibly avoid it. Still, Nate had a point. Best to ditch this bright yellow monstrosity at the first available opportunity.

The bright yellow monstrosity sputtered once it hit speed, and then the engine cut out completely. Sully cursed as the power steering locked out and he was forced to use all of his strength to keep the car on the road, dragging the steering wheel back over and slamming his foot on the brake. The car shuddered to a jerky stop just off the embankment, and left the three of them in a shocked, tense silence.

“Dammit,” said Sully. “ _Dammit_.”

“What the hell was that?” Nate demanded.

Elena leaned forward and slapped the front of the Jeep. “GPS tracking,” she said. “They reported the car stolen, and the company shut it off remotely. We’re never going to get it started.”

“How do you _know_ that?”

Shit. Sully pulled open the door and jumped out, drawing his gun. “Come on. We’re going to have to fight our way out.”

“Can’t we just _once_ be attacked by friendly guys, and have it all be a big misunderstanding?” Elena said as she joined Sully by the side of the Jeep. “I mean, how do you even know these guys worked for Marlowe?”

“Because only Marlowe’s people would know about the Atlantis of the Sands,” Sully told her. “Because only Marlowe’s people would know what _happened_ to the Atlantis of the Sands. Because one of them picked my pocket, and because they almost killed us just now by shutting the car off. Take your pick. Nate, where are you?”

“Up here.” Nate’s head popped over the top of the Jeep. “I thought having a vantage point might be useful.”

Of course he did. Of _course_ he was on top of the Jeep. Sully sighed, hefted his pistol, and walked slowly out into the middle of the road, Elena right beside him. “Come on out,” he called into the rapidly dwindling twilight. “We know you’re there.”

“Funny,” came Vex’s voice. “I was about to say the same thing. I feel cheated.”

He and his husband faded out of the gloom, walking towards them, completely relaxed. Neither of them had a gun, but Sully didn’t lower his. He’d seen what these people could be capable of. He wasn’t giving anyone the benefit of any doubt.

“Oh.” The husband stopped, and put his hands in the air. “Guns. Whoops. Probably should have thought to bring those.”

Vex glanced over at him. “We have guns?”

“We don’t have guns?”

The Moroccan guy wasn’t anywhere around, so Sully didn’t relax. They could easily have a sniper hidden in the trees, and they were _way_ too relaxed for a couple of unarmed guys with guns pointed at them. Nate hidden on top of the Jeep put Sully a little more at ease, but he still didn’t take his finger off the trigger.

“Hey, Sully.” Elena put a hand on his arm and waited until Sully looked over. “That’s not – he kind of looks a bit like Nate, don’t you think?”

“I don’t see it,” Sully grunted. Didn’t mean anything, anyway. It couldn’t.

The husband whistled. “Wow. Alright, I take back what I said before. I’m no longer hurt. Look at her, Dex. No _wonder_ he wasn’t interested. Seriously, a silver fox if ever I saw one. He could give workshops.”

Elena’s curiosity morphed into disgust. “What?”

Sully tried very hard not to be offended by the disgust, focusing instead on the two overenthusiastic cult hunters he was faced with. “Still flattered,” he said. “And you’re still not my type. Want to explain why you’re following us?”

“Well, let’s see,” said the husband. “You practically _ran_ out of the empty bar, read really hot and then _really_ cold on the stairs, and then you stole our car. I love that car, you know. I put it together myself.”

“ _You_ put it together?” Vex cut in, laughing.

“I painted it. It totally counts.”

“Sure, Rover. Whatever you say.”

“Uh…” Elena elbowed Sully and spoke quietly. “They don’t really sound like they’re trying to kill us.”

“You’re right,” Sully admitted.

“And we _did_ steal their car.”

Yeah, okay. They did. Sully lowered his gun, slowly, trusting Nate to keep them both covered. “If you’re not following us,” he said, “then how do you know about Uvar?”

“Ubar,” Elena corrected him.

“Ubar. Whatever. Atlantis of the Sands. You were talking about it in the bar.”

The husband – Rover – dropped his hands, looking surprised. “ _That’s_ what this is about? Ubar?”

Vex stepped past him, and Sully fought the urge to raise his gun again. “What do you guys know about Ubar? Do you have any idea who sank it last week?”

Rover looked at him. “Someone _sank Ubar_?”

Vex ignored him, his gaze intent and still on Sully. No half-assed answers here, then. Sully took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and took the plunge. “Yeah. Someone sank Ubar. I know who sank it, but I’m going to need a really good reason for why you two are interested.”

He expected an argument, and was surprised when all Vex did was nod. “Okay. Not who, then. Tell me _how_ Ubar was sunk.”

“Why?”

“Because enquiring minds want to know,” Vex said with a shrug. “Ubar was a protected city once, and it was well on the way to becoming a protected city again. If one person was able to single-handedly sink it into the desert, I need to know how they did it. If it was a fluke or an accident, fine. But if it wasn’t, then whatever did it might be something that shouldn’t fall into the wrong hands. Prove to me it was an accident, and we’ll leave. Hell, I’ll even give you the Jeep.”

Rover squawked indignantly behind him. “I _painted_ that Jeep!”

“You can always paint another one.”

“But this one was a masterpiece!”

“It was _yellow_ , Rover. You can paint another car that exact same shade of yellow, and no one’s going to know the difference.”

“ _I’ll_ know the difference,” Rover objected haughtily. “ _I’ll_ know it’s not the same car, and _you’ll_ know it’s not the same car, and the joke stops being funny if we try to re-hash it like that. Can’t we give them something else? Anything else?”

Despite himself, Sully chuckled. “Okay,” he said. “Say we believe you. Proof? What kind of proof?”

“A convenient recording of the whole thing would be nice.”

Sully clicked his fingers. “Damn. Must have left that back at the hotel.”

“Ah, well. How did it happen? Was there a certain lever you pulled, or did you perform an ancient Sumerian rite by accident?”

Sully hesitated. “Actually, I think it was a few bullets.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. We were getting shot at, and there was a big swinging candelabra thing, and we shot it down to take care of them all without having to waste more bullets. Kind of took the rest of the place down with it.”

Vex stared at him. Rover stared at him. For a very long minute, there was a long, awkward silence.

“You managed to do,” said Vex slowly, “what people have been trying to do for thousands of years, and you did it with a few _bullets_?”

“What people?” Sully asked. “We were the first ones to find the damn place.”

“Sure you were.” Rover stepped up to his husband’s side and knuckled him on the side of the head. “Why didn’t you tell me someone sank Ubar? And while we’re on the subject, why can’t we give them something else? We can give them guns. They like guns, and we have plenty we’re not using. I’m not sure where they _are_ , but I know we have them.”

“We,” Vex said, completely ignoring Rover. “Is that you two, or…?”

“Are you telling me,” Nate said from behind Sully and Elena, “that we actually _did_ get attacked by friendly guys, and this is all a big misunderstanding?”

“We weren’t attacked,” Elena pointed out. “If anything, we attacked them.”

“We didn’t attack them.”

“Seriously, am I the only one who remembers the part where we stole their car?”

“I remember that part,” Rover said, putting his hand into the air like he was answering a question at school. “I remember being thoroughly put out, too. You all seemed so _nice_.”

“Who are you, then?” asked Vex. “The three of you? How did you find Ubar, and what were you doing there?”

“Hey,” said Sully. “I thought all we had to do was prove to you destroying it was an accident.”

Vex frowned. “I thought we were all friends now. Can’t we just chalk this up as a friendly conversation?”

Rover gasped, very suddenly, slamming a hand down on Vex’s shoulder and startling everyone standing on the road. For the first time in their brief conversation, he actually looked serious. It was almost scary. “Dex,” he said. “Look.”

“Look at what?”

“ _Look_.”

“I’m looking.”

They were both looking at Nate. Sully tried to ignore the sinking feeling in his gut, but it was next to impossible. Instead, he looked back at Nate, who glanced between the three of them with utter confusion on his face. “What?”

“You don’t see it?” Elena asked.

“No,” said Nate. “See what?”

“You two look _exactly alike_ ,” Rover answered, face still perfectly serious, but with comically wide eyes. “That’s _amazing_.”

“Not exactly alike,” Sully muttered. “Just similar, that’s all.”

“Are you kidding? Normally, I’d be deferring to anything a silver fox like yourself says –”

“No you wouldn’t,” Vex cut in.

“– but look at their faces. Spitting images. How can you claim that’s not _exactly alike_? All Dex has to do is dye his hair, and then –”

“You’re not allowed a threesome without at least _asking_ the nice gentleman first, Rover.”

“– and then I can check a threesome off my bucket list, and –”

“Okay.” Nate raised his hands, nervously laughing. “That all sounds fascinating, but what is this about? Ubar was lost before we found it.”

“Most things _are_ lost before you find them,” Vex nodded.

Rover gasped again. “I know! You’re sorcerers, aren’t you? Nothing short of sorcery would have gotten you even _close_ to Ubar, let alone kept you alive while you were inside it. Few misplaced bullets, my ass. What do any of you have against Ubar? Are you Atlanteans? Are you mad your name got stolen?”

Vex groaned. “Can we at least _pretend_ that we’re usually subtle?”

“Sorcerers?” Elena took a completely justified step back behind Nate and Sully, glancing around with the same confusion Nate had worn earlier. “What do you mean, _sorcerers_?”

She thought they were insane. Sully couldn’t blame her. Overenthusiastic cult hunters, the lot of them. What worried Sully was that Nate was staying quiet, brow furrowed, watching them with an expression Sully didn’t know how to read. It _could_ have been disbelief, but it could have been intrigue too.

“Oh, come on.” Rover grinned at them. “You can’t _not_ be sorcerers. Drop the act.”

No one spoke. Rover’s smile slipped a little. “Then you’ve got to _know_ about sorcerers. You’ve got to know we exist.”

The silence stretched on.

“I don’t think they know,” Vex muttered to him.

“Damn it,” Rover murmured. “And _I’m_ the one who has to pay for Scrutinous’s gas money, too. Look, one of you has to know.” He jabbed a finger at Nate. “You’re being very quiet. You’re the one who knows, aren’t you?”

“Me?” Nate looked surprised. “No.”

“But you’ve heard about sorcerers.”

“No.”

“Not a single myth? Not even a _rumour_? I have to tell you, I find that hard to believe. You look ponderous. People don’t get ponderous when they hear magic exists unless they already had a pretty good idea it did. I am calling shenanigans on you, Mr. Dex-two.”

“What? Shenanigans? I – I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.”

It was like watching a train wreck. Everything Sully worked so hard for over the years unraveled before his eyes, and he had no idea how to stop it – or whether he even should. Nate was a grown man. He could make decisions for himself. Besides, hadn’t Sully started this whole trek because he wanted to show Nate another life, not to bar him from this one completely?

“Ah, shit.” He was _really_ getting too old for this. Before Rover could so much as squeak in protest, Sully cleared his throat and put his hands up to draw attention to himself. “Alright, Nate. Look, there’s… something I probably should have told you a long time ago.”

Rover burst out laughing. Nate’s head snapped towards Sully, that same expression on his face, only now there was fear added into the mix. “Sully?”

“Not here,” Sully amended firmly. “Not in the middle of the road like common criminals. Come on, let’s go back to the hotel and order drinks.”

“Oh, this is going to be _good_.” Rover took a running leap onto his husband’s back, and because Vex’s only reaction was to grunt and roll his eyes, Sully didn’t need to ask how often this kind of thing happened. “Come on, husband o’ mine. Let’s go watch someone’s mind being blown.”

Vex craned his neck to peer up at him. “What about the Jeep?”

“Jeep, schmeep. The Jeep can wait. Just lock it up so no one steals it.”

“You have the keys.”

“They’re in my back pocket. You can reach them. Give my arse a grope while you’re there.”

Nate glanced at Sully. “Seriously. What the hell just happened?”

“We’ve all gone insane,” Sully told him with a friendly hand on his shoulder. “Just keep believing that, kid, and we’ll all get through this in one piece. You’re probably going to want to be drunk, too.”

“Yeah, right.” Nate brushed the hand off his shoulder. “Look, Sully, just tell me what’s going on.”

“Nate, I’m about to tell you sorcery exists. Do you really want to have that conversation here?”

“Uh –” Nate glanced around once, thinking impressively quickly on his feet, and then shook his head. “On second thought, no. Did they have anything good at the bar?”

“It’s England, kid. There’s never anything good at the bar.” Sully glanced behind them. “Elena? You coming?”

Elena stood frozen and anxious in the middle of the road, her gun still in her hand, her gaze flickering between the four men with frightened suspicion and wariness. Eventually, she gestured weakly at the Jeep. “We really shouldn’t leave that there.”

Rover waved her concern away from atop Vex’s back. “I’ve left it at the bottom of volcanoes before. It’ll be fine. Come on, we’re wasting daylight!”

Vex sighed. “There’s no more daylight, Rover.”

“Exactly! We’ve wasted it!”

“Let’s go drive the Jeep off a cliff,” Sully muttered.

“Let’s… not make them angry,” Nate suggested carefully. He definitely caught on quick, even if he had no idea what to make of sorcerers just yet. Sully always thought the word ‘sorcerer’ was over-pretentious anyway. ‘Overenthusiastic cult hunter’ felt more accurate. He thought about saying so, and then decided Nate’s advice was probably the best way to go.

He just hoped no one would have a reason to draw a gun again before they’d gotten back to the bar.


	2. The After-Aftermath

Dexter Vex wasn’t the sort of man who spent more than a minute in front of the mirror each day, so when they went back into the hotel he stopped in front of a lobby mirror and examined his reflection with a fresh eye. He found, to his surprise, that Rover was right. He and Nathan Drake really did look far too similar for it to be coincidence.

He mulled that over while Sully ordered everyone drinks, tipping his chair back and putting his feet on the table. Elena gave him a strange look, which Dexter returned with a smile, but he didn’t remove his feet. The bartender hadn’t cared, and that was good enough for him.

Or maybe Elena’s strange look had more to do with the story Sully was telling. Dexter couldn’t be sure.

“I knew about it right away,” Sully admitted, somehow avoiding looking sheepish. “Well… suspected, really. But the kinds of things you could do, Nate – haven’t you ever stopped to wonder why no one else can?”

“You can,” said Drake. “Flynn could. Chloe –”

“No, Nate. We can climb, sure, but that’s it. We can’t keep going for days. I can’t get shot in the gut and then climb a dangling train car, fight off dozens of guys on a frozen mountain peak, and take down a psychotic war criminal without getting it properly looked at. You don’t run out of energy. Your muscles never burn. Jesus, Nate, are you going to tell me you’ve never noticed _any_ of that?”

“No!” Drake made to get up, then fell heavily back into the chair and dropped his head into his hands. “I don’t know. I just – I thought it was _weird_ , but…”

“Do you remember being really, really sick for a few days in your late teens or early twenties?” Rover asked. He sat next to Dexter, leaning forward with his chin in his hands and looking quite the avid listener. “I mean, _really_ sick. Like, in pain, couldn’t-get-out-of-bed sick.”

Drake didn’t answer, but the look on his face meant he didn’t have to. Rover nodded sagely. “That would have been your Surge. All sorcerers go through it. Basically locks in your magic and sends it soaring to new heights, but it sucks while you’re having it. And then it feels great when it’s over! It’s like a really, really twisted version of bad sex.”

Drake shook his head. “You’re as bad as Sully.”

“Oh, _really_?”

“The point is,” Dexter cut in before Rover could follow up on that thought, “that nothing has to change if you don’t want it to. I mean, you’re going to live a little longer than normal –”

“A little?” Drake went pale. “How much is a little?”

Dexter chose not to answer that just yet. “– but otherwise, you have friends, you have a beautiful fiancée, you have a life doing something you enjoy. You don’t need to give all of that up. In fact, I’m ordering you not to.”

“But,” said Rover, “if you _do_ want to find out more, you can consider us guides. I have to take _some_ responsibility for you finding out, after all.”

“Isn’t there a way to just… dip a toe in the water?” Drake asked. “You know, get the best of both worlds?”

“Of course there is. Plenty of us do. But, uh, that’s something you should probably discuss with your gorgeous fiancée. You know. Because you’re getting married. And people in our line of work tend be _really_ self-absorbed, really impulsive, and a little bit insane. You should know. You’ve met one.”

“Nate,” said Sully, “so help me, if you turn out like Marlowe –”

Nate gave a very sardonic laugh, putting paid to that particular fear before Sully could even voice it properly.  “I’m not going to turn out like Marlowe,” he said. “I couldn’t if I wanted to. You don’t need to worry.”

“But while we’re on that subject,” Dexter spoke up, leaning forward far enough to take his boots off of the table. “You need to take a new name.”

“I do? Why?”

“Because sorcerers can control people through the names they’re born with. It’s your first line of defence. I’m surprised Marlowe didn’t try that actually, unless – hang on. Drake isn't your real name, is it?”

Drake laughed. “No, it isn't. I changed it when I was thirteen. Doing well so far, huh?”

“Now, hang on. Don’t get cocky.” Rover leaned forward as well, elbows transferring from his knees to the edge of the table. “Just for the hell of it, what _was_ your name before you changed it?”

“Does that matter?”

“Humour me.”

“All I've been doing is humouring you,” Drake objected. “Look, it’s not my name anymore, alright? Can we go back to that ‘you’ll live a little longer’ thing?”

Rover waved a hand. “Eight hundred years, give or take.”

“ _Eight hundred_ –”

“What was your name before you changed it?”

Drake stared at him, utterly speechless. Then he stared at Sully, equally speechless. Sully shrugged, as if to say ‘you’re on your own from here, kid.’ To Dexter’s surprise, Elena was the only one who didn’t look even mildly startled – although that could have been for a variety of reasons. She probably didn’t believe a word they were saying.

“How old are _you_?” Drake demanded, his attention back on Rover.

Rover gave a very Sully-esque shrug. “Chronologically, physically, or mentally?”

“Just for the fun of it, let’s say all three.”

Rover ticked off each answer on his fingers. “Somewhere over nine hundred, somewhere around forty, somewhere around five hundred and fifty. It’s a long story. Well, actually, it’s a short story – I can turn myself to stone. But _explaining_ the story would take a long time, and it would be stupidly boring, so let’s focus on you again. What was the name your parents gave you?”

“Okay, you know what?” Drake kicked his chair back and folded his arms. “I’m not telling either of you another word until you prove all of this.”

Dexter chuckled. “That’s fair.” He brought both hands forward, concentrated, and slowly formed a hat between them out of the energy pulsing between his palms. When the hat was fully-formed, he tossed it up. Rover, grinning widely, sent the hat tumbling over to perch on top of Drake’s head with a sudden breeze which tousled their table. Drake jerked violently backwards and fell over the back of his chair. Sully cursed, and for once, Elena did too, leaping to her feet with a hand at her mouth that very quickly transferred to her forehead.

“Jesus…” she muttered, turning and walking over towards the bar.

“Good enough for you?” Dexter asked with a grin of his own. “Or do you need me to prove something else?”

Drake pulled the hat – which had miraculously stayed on top his head even through the tumble – off and threw it down onto the table. “No. No, I’m – I think I’m good.”

“I didn’t know that was possible,” said Sully.

“It’s not usually,” Dexter nodded. “I’m what’s called an Energy-Thrower. I’m also the only Energy-Thrower in the world who’s learned to control the energy far enough to conjure.” He gestured at the hat, and it dissipated into thin air. “It’s real, and I can conjure things that last for as long as I do.”

As long as he was mentally stable, anyway. When Rover turned himself to stone to survive Serpine's assault - saving Dexter's life in the process - Dexter had spent the next decade utterly unable to conjure. Even Hopeless hadn't been able to do anything to help; the only cure in the end had been Rover's timely and rambunctious return.

“And I’m an Elemental!” Rover announced, clicking his fingers to conjure a flame. “The grand majority of us are Elementals. It’s exactly what it sounds like.”

Drake held up a hand. “So that wind –”

“- was me, yep.”

“Then what am I?”

Rover’s smile faded. “No idea. Bloody lucky, though. Hey, maybe you’re a fortune mage or something.”

“A fortune mage,” said Dexter, “with a propensity for endless energy?”

Rover shrugged. “Specialisation. Or maybe you're ambidextrous.”

“Or maybe he has endless energy, and happens to be _skilled_ enough to get in and out of Ubar without a scratch.”

Rover pretended to think about it, and then shook his head. “ _Nah_. Fortune mage.”

Dexter sighed and looked back at Drake. “Do you feel pain?”

“Yeah.”

“No.” Sully reached out and tapped Drake’s wrist. “That’s not true, kid. You only think you do.”

“I feel pain, Sully.”

“You feel shock,” Sully corrected him. “And maybe some temporary exhaustion. But you don’t get hurt, not like someone normal does.”

Drake didn’t have an answer to that, but he shook Sully’s hand off his wrist anyway. “Jesus, Sully. You hide this from me my whole life, and now suddenly you’re going to pick apart every tiny thing I say?”

“You’re damn right I am. You were safe as long as you didn’t know. Now you do, I’m not going to let you lie to the only people who might actually manage to keep you safe.”

Rover nodded. “Sage advice. Also, pain is not a _tiny_ thing, and anyone who’s felt it knows that. You just gave yourself away. Check and mate.”

Drake looked at him. “What?”

“Sit down,” Dexter told him. “We still have a lot to go through, and you might as well be comfortable while we go through it.”

“We haven’t even told you about the living skeleton yet,” Rover agreed.

It took almost a minute, but then Drake finally did sit down, slowly, tensely, without taking his eyes off either of them. “Living skeleton?”

Rover grinned. “Living skeleton.”

“His name is Skulduggery,” said Dexter. “You’ll like him.”

~~

Elena hadn't meant to actually leave the bar, but suddenly the atmosphere was much too stifling for her and she needed some air. So she left, slipping out without drawing attention to herself, fiddling with the ring on her finger as she walked over to the lobby. The ring she hadn't taken off since Nate first put it on her finger three years ago, even though they’d separated not long after.

It wasn’t the hat which was getting to her. Not really. It was _weird_ , sure, and it was creepy on a very fundamental level, but it wasn’t much weirder than anything else Nate and Sully had put her through. Actually, it almost made her feel _better_ , knowing that there was an explanation for all the crazy stuff she’d seen over the years, as unbelievable as the explanation was. She was a journalist. Finding the story behind things was what she lived for, and this…?

Elena laughed wryly. _This_ was the story of the _century_ , and she doubted she'd even be able to print it.

So no, it wasn’t the hat. It was Nate. She _knew_ Nate. Dip a toe in the water, her ass – he was going to dive in the moment he got over his shock, and Elena wasn’t so sure she could follow. Hell, even if she wanted to – sorcerers? People who lived to _eight hundred_? There was no way she’d be able to keep up, and she wasn’t so naïve as to think Nate might actually choose love over adventure. She’d hoped, once, and gotten it thrown back in her face.

So was this it? Would Elena have to choose between being some bit on the side, or cutting Nate from her life completely?

She got to the lobby and stopped. No one was on duty at the front desk. Innocent, maybe – except Elena had spent too much time around Nate and Sully not to immediately grow suspicious. She drew her pistol and stepped cautiously further into the lobby, sweeping it from one corner to –

“Drop it,” the man over by the front door growled.

Elena cursed again, and knelt down to put the pistol carefully on the floor.

“Kick it over here.”

She did so, raising her hands over her head. This made… what, five times? Yeah. Five times getting captured while holding a gun. Was there some kind of world record for that? Could she apply for a grant?

“Now,” said her captor. “Tell me where Dexter Vex is.”


End file.
